Advantages

Disadvantages

Not Recommended

Introduction

When the weather is as warm as it is right now, we are often opening the windows to cool down. The problem is that while the window is open it allows various creepy insects to fly right in and make themselves welcome. I am terrified of spiders, I hate moths, but none of those previously mentioned insects manage to annoy me quite as much as flies. When a fly is buzzing around my head I really do find myself getting extremely irritated. It is never long before I am on my feet trying to swat the annoying little gits. No matter how thoroughly I clean my house they often come in and it makes me really fed up. It only seems to happen when the weather is really warm. In the back of my mind, I wanted to find something to get rid of them, something that would exterminate them in the most effective way possible. Yes I really do hate flies!

On a recent trip to the shops with my Boyfriend we saw these Astro Fly traps. My face lit up with glee as I looked at them and turned to ask the shop assistant how well they worked. I noticed the amused look on her face and I am guessing she found my enthusiasm towards killing the little winged devils more than a little bit funny. Either that or she thought I was slightly nuts but I couldn't help but be enthusiastic about this product and the thought of finally getting rid of the damn flies. She told me that they are quite effective, so believing her, and imagining a fly free house, I bought them without a second thought.

When I saw these I was reminded of sticks of dynamite and assumed based on the way that the product was presented that they would be very effective. Seeing the words "Pest Control" and "High Quality" made me feel that I had made the right decision in purchasing these. They come in a packet of 8 and I thought if nothing else they would at least last a while. I left the shop imagining the incredibly annoying little pests that fly in through my window vanishing forever and ever. I could not wait to get home and test them out!

Unrealistic Expectations of a First Time Pest Control Buyer.

I examined the packet much more closely when I got home. On closer examination it actually says no baiting, no poisons, no vapour, no mess on those little fly traps. I was disappointed when I realized this and felt it was an indication of a product that would be pretty useless for my desired purpose of killing flies. I was a little bit too optimistic in my expectations for this product to be entirely honest. On my first impressions I was imagining unscrewing the cap, hearing a small bang, a substance only lethal to insects filling the room and then immediately killing any flies within the radius in which it was opened. Instead I got something that looked rather lethal to flies but had no effect at all. This was my first time purchasing Pest Control and I really did not know what to expect.

Description

I lifted one of the yellow cylinders out of the packet noticing how light it was to lift up. The cylinders are covered in yellow paper. On the back of the paper there are instructions for use. Although I used one of these on the very first day of purchase, I never really took the time to discover what they are made of. With that in mind I decided to peel the paper back to reveal the second layer which I just discovered is made of cardboard.

Using the Fly Trap

Following the instructions I brought the cylinder to room temperature. I then slowly pulled out the red string on top and unwound the adhesive strip in anticlockwise direction. The red string did not need to be pulled hard to reveal the adhesive strip. The cap fell off and a thumb tack fell out while doing this. Having read the instructions, I knew that I would need the thumb tack in another minute or two. So I sat it somewhere safe until ready to use it. The adhesive strip is covered in glue and is an icky brown colour. It is ugly to be honest and I did not look forward to hanging it on my wall. The adhesive strip is rather long and gooey and takes quite a bit of unwinding. I then went in search of the area to hang it on. I found the wall in the kitchen to be a good place for the second trap. I tried to hang it up but couldn't.

The thumb tack takes quite a bit of pushing into the wall and whilst doing this my hand got covered with the glue. In the end Paul kindly offered to do it and he used a screwdriver to ensure it was securely placed on the wall. We wanted it on the wall as securely as possible because we want to ensure it can not drop off and get into contact with our puppy. There is a little white circular piece of cardboard covering the tack that only managed to make it even harder to do. The one in the Kitchen has literally just been hung up there now. The one in the living room has been there a few days because I wanted to give it time in which to work and also to make the review fair. Unfortunately it has not proved to be in the slightest bit effective. There were still flies and none of them appear to have been caught in the gooey trap.

Instructions On Cylinder VS Additional Instructions On Packet

Cylinder

Bring to room temperature.Pull out red string and unwind adhesive in anticlockwise direction.Discard the removed cap and hang with thumb tack.In case of contact with glue wash hands.

Packet

On the packet the instructions are different and they advise you to use protective gloves. There is no mention of this on the actual trap and because of this I did not use them. They also tell you to wash your hands and use a mild deteraent after use, I think they meant to say detergent. Noticing the spelling mistake on detergent only made me notice that there was a lot more. On the part that it says bring to room temperature it is written bring toroom temperature ( no spaces.) They also said protestive when they meant to say protective and wate instead of water. Admittedly I am guilty of lots of spelling, grammar and punctuation mistakes myself. I actually use an application to help with mine and still manage to make mistakes. If I was selling any kind of product though, I would do my best to ensure that the instructions were clearly written. I would even pay someone else to if I was unsure of my ability to do that. Isn't presentation meant to be an important part of selling products and coming over as professional? I am baffled how they managed to screw this up so much because the actual traps at least look professional. Astro not mentioning about wearing protective gloves on the actual traps resulted in me wearing none at all and that is something you are not supposed to do.

Where Are They Made?

After just quickly looking at their website, I found this by typing the name Astro and Pest Control into the Google search engine. I just found out that they have been serving South Georgia since 1969. For them to have been around that long, I would expect much better from their product. It appears that if you live in Georgia or a couple of other locations (none of which are actually from where I live in Northern Ireland.) You can request their services to help with pest control but based on my experience with their fly traps I would not.

Price

This is relatively inexpensive but in my honest opinion a total waste of money. Paul agrees with this conclusion having noticed how ineffective it has been. The price is 1. 25 but for this price you could probably find an insect spray that is much more effective. I did find an insect spray much more effective in the end.

Overall

I honestly do not see how these traps can be described as being of high quality. I am really disappointed in them. I resorted to getting a can of insect killing spray and that worked a million times better in just a few minutes than Astro Fly Traps worked over the space of three whole days. I believe I have been very fair in giving the trap three days to work. They have not worked in the slightest, they just managed to hang on my wall, looking rather unattractive and I cannot wait to throw them all in the bin to be honest. I thought I would use them all to get full value for my money but during writing this I have realized that it would be useless and I would just be putting holes in my wall for no good reason. I do not recommend this at all!